Fariz drove his heels into his mount's flanks, the scimitar whistling down toward Tazien’s neck.
Kadaar moved. He pivoted on his back foot, driving his left arm upward inside the arc of the swing to strike Fariz's wrist. The flat of the blade clattered harmlessly against Kadaar's cured leather bracer. Without pausing, Kadaar clamped the envoy's sleeve and wrenched the joint back until the radial bone cracked. The scimitar slid into the mire.
Fariz shrieked, his free hand clutching the ruined joint. The gelding reared in the slush. Kadaar hauled the envoy clear of the stirrups by the collar of his silk surcoat, dropping him into the frozen sludge beside the dropped blade.
The line of cavalry sat motionless. Sunk-cheeked and hollowed out by three weeks of half-rations through the northern passes, the officers stared down at the imperial envoy thrashing in the dirt.
“The terms stand,” Kadaar’s voice, low and resonant, cut through the biting wind. “Gold for grain. Or deeds for grain. Your choice.” He gestured to the vast, snow-dusted fields stretching behind him, the hardy Sun-Silk Wheat already poking through the thin layer of ice. “My stores are full. Yours are not.”
Wind whistled over the wagon ruts. A veteran lieutenant at the head of the third rank raised his iron-tipped lance. But it wasn’t aimed at Kadaar. He pivoted the haft in his gauntlet, centering the tip between Fariz’s shoulder blades.
“Our mounts ate harness leather yesterday,” the lieutenant said, his voice flat. “The men won't die on frozen mud for an empty supply train.”
One by one, other spears followed. Shafts dipped in unison along the front line. Forty spearheads leveled at Fariz, who clawed backward through the slurry until his back hit a wagon wheel.
“We sign the grain chits,” the lieutenant said, keeping his lance fixed on Fariz.
Seven days later, a gray imperial courier raven dropped onto the farmstead's watchtower rail. It carried a single, tightly rolled parchment, sealed with the crest of the Obsidian Throne.
Tazien broke the seal. She read the thin parchment while Kadaar inspected the bird's flight bands. Zarifa leaned against the timber parapet, wrapping sheepskin closer around her throat.
“The Culling of the Chancellors is complete,” Tazien stated, her voice even. “Omariyan Bakh was among those executed. Along with his entire retinue.” She folded the parchment with deliberate slowness. “His Majesty, in his infinite wisdom and facing an empire on the brink of famine, has seen fit to acknowledge the ‘Vosh Hegemony’ of the Steppes. He has officially decreed Kadaar Vosh as the ‘Lord of the Northern Breadbasket,’ with absolute autonomy over these territories. He demands a ‘modest’ yearly tribute in grain, in exchange for official recognition and protection from foreign aggression.”
Kadaar let out a soft, mirthless chuckle. “Tribute. He still calls it tribute.”
“And protection,” Tazien added, a faint, almost imperceptible curve to her lips. “From himself, it seems.”
Zarifa grinned, a flash of white against her wind-chapped face. “So, we own the fields now. Officially.”
“We always owned them,” Kadaar corrected, looking out at the vast expanse of their burgeoning wealth. “He merely put a crown on our wheat.”
Beneath the towering walls of the Vosh stronghold, in the newly constructed stables, Nisari Fashar grumbled as she shoveled steaming horse manure into a wheelbarrow. Her once silken robes had been replaced by coarse, patched wool, and her delicate hands were calloused and red. Her fine hair, once meticulously styled, was now perpetually damp with sweat and clinging straw. Her daily ration of gruel was dependent on her efficiency, and the Vosh stablemaster, a man with a booming laugh and an unforgiving eye, ensured she earned every last spoonful.
She looked up, catching sight of the silhouette of Tazien and Kadaar standing high on the fortified walls, outlined against the grey sky. Nisari seethed, but her resentment was a dull, constant ache now, overshadowed by the exhaustion of her new reality. She gripped the shovel, her knuckles white, and plunged it back into the pungent mound.
Up on the battlements, the wind whipped around Tazien and Kadaar. Tazien remained at the parapet beside Kadaar, shoulder to shoulder against the gale.
Her gaze drifted eastward, past the endless fields of Sun-Silk Wheat, past the snowy peaks, towards the invisible, distant city where the Obsidian Throne resided. The city that had once cast her out, tried to kill Kadaar, and orchestrated the quiet deaths of countless others.
“It begins now, Kadaar,” Tazien whispered, her voice carrying on the wind, cold and clear as the winter air. “Now, we starve the ruler.”